In this age of selfies and X-factors, spare
a thought for the insidious damage that is being done to the development of
Australian serious culture. Given that Bob Dylan may have sung ‘…don’t
criticize what you can’t understand, your sons and your daughters are beyond
your command, your old road is rapidly agin’. Please get out of the new one if
you can’t lend a hand…’ should we be bothered? Yes, very bothered indeed.
The reality that is hidden from many in the
Australian community, is just how pervasive the myopia of looking back to a
‘golden age’ is in promoting older generations’ inability to engage with the
contemporary world. Moronic grumbling about young people is celebrated and
published in major daily newspapers such as the Age and the SMH as significant
and worthwhile. If you think I am overstating the case, well consider this.
The vanity that is known as elitism
pervades the culture to a corrosive extent. Older people have lost the ability
to know when something is art, and worthy. Instead, they hang on every word of
their preserved conservatives, mouthing broad and unsubstantiated generalities.
Taiwan-born director Ang Lee says that,
wait for it, “Kids don’t even read comic books anymore. They’ve got more
important things to do – like video games.” If that isn’t selective use of a
curmudgeonly out-of-context citations to back up a spurious argument, what is?
Then there’s the toe-curling indulgence of those music stars, like the late Italian
opera singer Luciano Pavarotti. He claimed that; “In opera, as with any
performing art, to be in great demand and to command high fees you must be
good, of course, but you must also be famous.” Oh please! Can you imagine Josh
Pyke saying anything so crass?
Or how about this kind of Pavarotti
self-centered twaddle: “For me, music making is the most joyful activity
possible, the most perfect expression of any emotion.”
The Boomers lap up this kind of
self-conscious exhibitionism as a “serious” statement, as they have precious
little comparative contemporary comment beyond what is grumbled about at the
bar during intermission in one of the recent Ring Cycle performances, or in the
staffroom at certain elite private boys schools at lunchtime.
So, who’s at fault? Baby Boomers need do a
little more about engaging with contemporary, progressive culture, much of
which is building upon the so called ‘high culture’ of the past. Digital
technology, multi-platform narratives, higher mathematics references in ‘The
Simpsons’, young adult fiction that crosses readership boundaries and adds to
the ongoing cultural discourse of the nation. Serious contemporary cultural
artifacts that require patience and understanding need to be explained in small
words to grumpy, unwilling middle-aged pupils.
In Australia, elitism is the privilege of a
few, who then get into Parliament and rip funding from the public education
system and universities, while complaining about ‘jingoistic egalitarianism.’
But perhaps this is going too far? Who
should have to appreciate the finesse behind a slam poem by Omar Musa? Or who on earth Sonya
Hartnett or Shaun Tan are? As for admitting the value of institutions like the
National Institute of Youth Performing Arts, forget it. There are many other
examples.
Why this matters is that without a sense of
cultural progress, then we will be stuck in the past, with only so-called ‘high
cultural markers’ as the cornerstones of our national cultural identity, and of
cultural discourse more generally. We won’t be able to really really
concentrate or appreciate, for example, Mahler, because we’ll have no
familiarity with the musical traditions and skills that have been built upon
those very foundations.
The impact this will have on audiences is
cause for concern. In the next two decades, the elders or keepers of the
cultural treasures will be gone, and it’s completely impossible to conceive
that anyone currently under the age of forty will ever have any interest in the
cultural life of the country. You know, apart from all those ‘students’ who are
currently enrolled in various forms of ‘higher education’ in the ‘arts’ sector.
But then, where are the audiences going to
come from if today’s students are stifled in their ability to express and
explore their world and culture, other than through exposure only to ‘elite’
artforms? This is already happening. Ticket prices are not the cause, either.
It’s most likely to do with outdated attitudes to education among certain
elements of the teaching profession who are unable to engage their
students outside of a very narrow prism of experience. Clearly in the
contemporary world, this is a significant problem.
Sure private schools (like all schools) are
potentially important in destroying this damaging ‘elitism’ in cultural
discourse. I taught in one, and I taught serious, demanding contemporary
literature, right alongside serious, classically demanding literature. Was it
elite? Not if I had anything to do with it. But neither did it pander to the
lowest common denominator. Like all good literature teachers, I tried to teach
my students that context is everything, and that a nuanced observation of
contemporary adolescent life, like Melina Marchetta’s Looking for Alibrandi (or even her more contemporary works, written in the proceeding 20 years, such as
The Piper’s Son or On the Jellicoe Road) have as much to
offer to an enquiring, critical reader as, say Jane Eyre. Can you compare the
two? Absolutely. And you should.
This goes beyond subjective taste. Does Lou
Reed compare with Segovia? Well… it’s kind of an odd comparison, but I guess
that they might. Both were significant musicians of their eras, both served to
act as focal points for the development of their musical disciplines, and if
someone more knowledgeable than I were to apply themselves to the task, I’m
pretty certain that it would be possible to draw lines of stylistic influence
from The Velvet Underground back to
early 20th century guitar virtuosos, such as Segovia. But I could be
wrong. It’s certainly not a no brainer. Rather an interesting question, really…
These ‘frozen oldies’ are wedged in narrow
cultural doorways of fifty years ago, and are unable to push through into the
wider, room of cultural discourse beyond. They suck up smoothies of
conservative pap when anyone says anything “pithy” out of an increasing and
inevitable sense of their own irrelevance. But ‘pithy’ is a relative term.
Listen to Kurt Cobain, who articulated the disaffection of his generation with
the elitist ‘cultural worthiness’ continuum espoused by previous generations,
and left this “mortal coil” (Shakespeare, in case you haven’t been patronized
yet, today) with the following:
“I don’t have the passion any more, and so
remember, it’s better to burn out than fade away. Peace, love, empathy.”
Compare the immortal lyrical beauty of John
Keats, who also died young and said, “I feel the daisies growing over me.”
Uhm… okay. Aside from the obvious
difference in style, both clearly capture the essence of their context (that
pesky context thing again) and both therefore have cultural worth. It might be
possible to argue that the more allegorical approach taken by Keats to his
impending death was reflective of his awareness (owing to his death being slow,
by tuberculosis) of his own mortality, whereas the quote from Cobain’s suicide
note reflects a stronger sense of finality, and evinces the emotional trauma
evident in much of the cultural discourse of the time. Not sure what the point
of the comparison was, but there you are…
The ambivalence that certain ‘Elite’
members of the Baby Boomer generation have to any mention of ‘contemporary
culture’ is reflected in its suspicion of what appears to be difficult to
understand. In this sense, Boomers have opted out of their responsibility to
simply broaden their cultural awareness to include both Banksy and Hogarth.
The fear I have, is that cultural elitism will
be seen as preferable, even desirable, while damaging and inaccurate generalisations
are made about entire demographics, important contemporary cultural works and
performers are overlooked and unable to develop careers, and culture fails to
progress at all.
Of course, I might be wrong…
(Note to add: Of course I'm aware that, for the most part, the Baby Boomer generation is in no way reflected by the views expressed by Christopher Bantick in his column, and that I've been horribly and deliberately general in this response, but given the flawed premise undermining his piece, I figured it only appropriate to return the favour.)
